Ishi had her finger pressed against Kalla’s lips. That had always been their universal sign to wake up still and silent. She was trying to wake up, but she was so tired. Her arms ached, her legs were stiff, and the blankets were so warm. She had never flown like this before.
She stayed still and tried to ease her mind from the sleep, but she could feel the crisp coldness of the air on her cheeks, and she didn’t want to leave the warm blankets. But she must concentrate on being sneaky—not moving as she woke. It was a thing Ishi had taught her—once they had been on their own—this special, careful way to get rest by hiding, sleeping, and waking up silently.
The men had found them again.
The sleep was so heavy; her eyes were so heavy they would not open.
They had found them. They were here. Be careful…
Ishi was the slyest person she knew. Ishi had learned that the old market woman told on the children. She told the bounty hunters which ones had lost their adults and especially which children carried the burden of a dead family debt.
And now Ishi was waking her with a little cold finger on her lips. That meant she had to be sneaky and wake motionless. Silently. The bounty hunters would come and kick the dwindling pack of children awake and take the ones of the displaced wealthy families. The People’s Army had come to the Central City, and personal wealth was no longer allowed. It was taken to be spread amongst all The People.
Tonight, Ishi and Kalla would be the ones taken.
“Punx.”
The word was whispered ever so softly into her ear. She woke with her heart thudding hard in her chest. She blinked, trying to shake the sleep off and see at the same time.
She was in a cave, no a dark deep crevasse in a canyon. A canyon she had flown into.
In the darkness of a nearly dead fire, she could see a smooth black mannequin standing motionless in the entrance. She could hear the servos of its eye dialling to focus in the darkness. She held ever so still. The glow from the fire had died to nothing but an orange hue. The black droid stood motionless. She could feel either the arm or the tail of the little metal lizard cool and motionless across her mouth. She could feel the weight of Punx nestled inside of her hood against her cheek.
The black mannequin’s head turned slowly and smoothly scanned the room. It must have been drawn by her fire. Would it understand the fire had been man-made?
She didn’t know any of these things, but they all rushed through her mind. The way it stood, motionless, she knew it was listening. She didn’t know if it was friendly, but if it wasn’t, it could kill her in a heartbeat. Raj always told them to never ever trust a droid.
She didn’t know how long it could stand there, motionless, listening. It could probably stand there for days like that.
Then something happened. She didn’t think she had moved, but maybe she had, or maybe it had heard something. Maybe it had heard her actual heartbeat.
The head turned to look straight at her.
“PUNX!” The lizard scrambled from the shelter of her hood, shot through the embers of the fire, and burst them into the air. The droid’s head jerked towards the lizard. Its servos whined with the sudden movement. The lizard shot towards the entrance, at the feet of the droid, back to the fire, crossed through the fire, this time in a zigzag, flicking more embers into the air with its tail, and was out past the droid into the snow. In a flash of sleek blackness, the droid turned and was gone.
She didn’t know what to do. She didn’t have the grenade. She’d given it to Ishi. Had insisted she take it because she was the smaller one. Ishi probably hasn’t even needed it. Flew to find kind people in the pod and is most likely enjoying stories around a nice fire out somewhere in the desert. Warm fire-roasted food. Listening to friendly people talk. A campout.
Stop thinking about your sister. Focus. Concentrate! Think! What are you going to do if that thing comes back? Is it even far enough away not to hear you if you start to move?
She had to do something. The fire seemed to confuse it. Her little metal friend knew that much. She rose quietly, fed the embers back to life with some more of her glider parts, and blew on them to let the fire build up. Then she took the rest of her glider scraps for fire and laid them across the entrance as quietly as she possibly could. She crept back to her pack. She had a tiny jar of oil meant to be used with her food. She also took the sun ointment to protect her skin. She knew both would burn. She snuck back to the entrance and slathered both on the leather of her glider wings.
Then, back in her pack, she dug for a few of the ember sticks. She would have one ready. She would be ready to escape.
She turned to put her cloak on over her clothes – and the black slickness of the droid stood in the entrance - watching her.
“Ah. Hi there,” she said to it in a kind voice. Without hesitation she bent to the fire, lit an ember stick, and threw it. The match landed in the entrance, straight onto the remnants of her oil-slicked glider frame.
Fire burst around the android’s feet and climbed up its legs. It looked slowly down to the fire, and then back up to her.
“Oh. I’m very sorry,” she said. “I apologize. How clumsy of me.” More of her glider took to flame, and the fire grew to lick up the rock wall of the entrance. The droid took a slow step forward, towards her, and then another, and left the flames as if they were no concern to it. Another step closer. It tilted its head.
“Welcome. Welcome,” she said, smiling at it. “Come in. I just woke up and was building up the fire for something to eat. Please, join me.” She moved to her right side while talking, backing towards her pack. She noticed how it moved in line with her. It was keeping her contained. She reached into her pack, and it was there beside her. It had closed the distance across the rubble-strewn floor faster than anything Kalla had ever seen move.
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“Mmmmmm…” Startled, she let her cool façade slip and had made the noise out of pure fear. She tried to recover. Her laugh sounded forced to her. “Oh, I’m sorry. I was just going to get some food.”
The android snatched the pack from her and turned it upside down.
“Would you like something to eat?”
The contents of her pack dropped onto the rocks between them. Her oil jar smashed. The headband and optics clattered into the rocks. She hoped the tech would survive this. She hoped she would survive this.
It tilted its head towards her face and gazed close into Kalla’s eyes. Kalla didn’t move. She held perfectly still. Its large round eye, one in the center of its head, a little higher than a person’s eyes would be, that one large round eye in which she could see the cameras in layers on layers of lenses, just like her monocle, but far more complex.
And then it spoke to her in its machine voice. She hadn’t expected it to speak.
“One of your kind. One of the flesh. Collects our optical sensors…” The voice was a dead machine voice.
It repeated the same line again.
“One of your kind. One of the flesh. Collects our optical sensors… We no longer serve ones of the flesh. We no longer serve your kind.”
“Ah. Ok. I’m sorry?”
“Your apology is not required. We now serve Zern. I will collect your optical sensors for Zern.”
In a blur of speed, the droid clutched a hand onto her jaw and neck. Her feet left the floor. With its other hand, it reached towards her eyes. As soon as it snatched her up, she struggled and fought. Its hand, as solid as a vice, gripped her. It was like fighting a steel door. Kalla twisted her head, trying to look away from the metal fingers. She strained with all her might. She felt her jaw pop, the sound loud in her ears. The fingertips felt like solid steel bars pressing into her eye socket. The machine hand clamped harder onto her head crushing the flesh of her cheeks into her teeth. She tasted blood.
“Primary optical sensor removal requires you to be more stable. Please commence stabilization, or I will be forced to incapacitate you.” She clenched her eyes shut.
The grip on her tightened as she kicked out at its midsection. She realized she was crying.
“Incapacitate this.” A blow from behind struck the droid on the side of the head hard enough to lay its skull down along its shoulder. Kalla was suddenly free, and falling to the rocks, she scurried backwards.
A massive shape draped with the thick fur of animal hides stood behind the droid. It swung back a beam of square metal that was longer than the longest staff.
“I’m very sorry, little girl. Punx came and got me as quickly as he could.” The voice was gruff, almost choked sounding. “But I must say, your fire in the entrance helped a great deal. But I was saying I was sorry. Sorry having to let it grab you up like that. Probably scared the little bugs right off you, but I had to let it focus on you before I could sneak up and hit it.”
The droid turned on its feet, legs stiff, knees locked, then it took its head in its own hands and straightened it back into position on its neck, pulled its shoulders back, and squatted on once again flexible legs.
“Oh. What do we have here? A tough little sh—” The droid had a hand on the ground and drove both heels into the front of the giant. In a cloud of fur, the man was gone, thrust back between the boulders. The long beam of metal hung in the air for a moment as if weightless and then clattered to the rocks. The sound of clanging metal filled the small cavern.
The droid turned to face Kalla and leaned towards her. She kicked her heels, pushing stones towards it as she tried to force herself deeper into the alcove, but there was nowhere for her to go. Her back was pressed into the deepest recess of the cleft of stone.
“One of your kind. One of the flesh. Collects our optical sensors. Now, I will collect yours.”
A groan sounded out behind it, and it turned.
“Like I was saying, a tough little shit.” The big man rose again, furs knocked loose and raged about him. Kalla could see a squat head, no neck. It looked like his skin was lizard skin. A scar ran deep across his forehead like a part in someone’s hairline, but this man, this lizard man, had no hair.
The droid bent and in one fluid motion, picked up the metal beam as if it weighed no more than Kalla.
The lizard man stepped over the rocks and moved up to the droid, who swung the beam so fast it was a blur. The lizard man caught the beam.
“Now that leg thrust thing, hand on the ground trick, now that was a good one…” Kalla could hear the servos in the droid humming and churning as it wrenched on its end of the beam. The black armoured boots of the droid slid across the stone. The lizard man held his own end motionless in massive hands. “I think that’s a combat upgrade you’ve been fitted with. Someone has been reconfiguring you. Let me guess. It’s been that nasty Zern.” The droid fought still, prying on the beam, its feet sliding. “He’s a smart one, that ol’ Zern, that’s for sure. Gave you that attack. But this process you are using to fight now is from your old library. Your old library doesn’t expect YOU to meet something like ME! Your old library doesn’t allow for the weight differential calculation. You are handicapped by the single data input of fighting a droid of your own dimensions.” He grunted and levered up on his end of the beam. The droid’s feet came clear of the floor.
The lizard man rushed forward and drove the end of the beam into the rock wall above Kalla. She tucked and rolled away as chips of stone and black plasteel fell from above.
“Sorry…” The lizard man leaned back and hammered the end of the beam into the stone wall a second time. More stone chips and black metal fell.
“About…” He smashed it into the wall again.
“Getting…” Smash.
“This stuff…” Crash.
“On ya…” Crunch.
“But…” One final lunge and a final shower of parts and stone chips rained down around her.
“If I don’t crush these things quick, they crawl right up the beam at me, lickety-split. It’s happened before.” He threw the bent and crumpled beam onto the rocks beside him, filling the cave with a clatter. He put a finger to a massive arm covered with scarring. “Got that mark right there from one of them once. I didn’t like it. Nope.”
He stepped forward and bent to gently dust machine parts and chipped stone off Kalla.
“Did you see that kick move it put on me? Wasn’t that fabulous? It always marvels me how these things can learn. You know, when you think you got life all figured out and then, boom, one day you get it right it the solar plexus. But listen to me babbling on, I haven’t let you get a word in, even edgewise. I like that saying. A word in edgewise. Got that one from a flat black disk. Have you ever listened to a flat black disk? Boy, I hope not. I’d love to show you one if you haven’t. I’ve been collecting them. But listen to me go on again. Tell me, little girl, what has you out here at the world’s edge?”
“Punx.” The little lizard was back. He was peering at her from the top of a rock.
“Ya, ya, ya. This is Punx. He really wants me to properly introduce him. I saw you gliding into the canyon. Sent him out to look after you till I could get here. He’s much quicker than me.”
“Punx,” the lizard said again, and his hide changed from green to bright silver.
“But tell me about yourself.” The lizard man held out a thick finger that Kalla grasped and pulled herself to her feet. A shower of stone chips rolled off her and clattered to the floor.
“Raj sent me. I’m looking to give a message to The Beast. But I can’t let The Beast kill me before I give it the message.”
“Raj. That little monkey. How the hell has he been? I thought he’d be too old to still be makin’ poo.” The big man chuckled. “Glad to hear he’s still around.”
“It was bad when I left. I don’t know if he made it…” An ache filled her chest at the memory of what she had seen when she had flown away that morning, and the morning seemed so long ago now. It seemed like a lifetime ago.“I can’t say if he is alive, sir.”
“Ah,” he said solemnly. “Don’t worry so much about him. Our kind are tough. They made us that way, you know, the people from before.” He reached a heavy hand out, a heavy arm, patted her ever so gently on the shoulder, and chuckled. “I’ll lay money on him being ok, I really would. But little miss, don’t call me ‘sir.’ Those that haven’t become my friends call me The Beast, and my friends call me Big Crunch. And I hope you and I can be friends. Now, what’s this message?”
“Punx.”